Acts of Love and Civil Disobedience

My wife and I in 2005. Oh so young!

This week my wife, E (abbreviated for privacy reasons), and I celebrate our 21st wedding anniversary. We've been legally married far longer than most same-sex couples in the United States. In fact, when the Obergefell v. Hodges decision was issued by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2015 (legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide), we were about to celebrate our 17th anniversary.

So how did we accomplish this act of love and civil disobedience? And in a conservative state like Arizona, no less?  Well, that is a funny little story.

When Dharma Met E

E and I are both transgender. Both assigned male at birth, but knew that's not who we were. I transitioned and underwent gender confirmation surgery before we met. In fact, the first time we met, I was married to my now ex-husband, R.

A group of mutual friends, most of us trans, met at a local Cajun restaurant. I was doing a lot of complaining that night because everything I ordered was super spicy, including the potato salad and the coleslaw. E's first impression of me was that I was the grumpy girl who didn't like spicy food.

When we met again a year later, I had separated from--but was still married to--my ex-husband. R was abusive, and I had finally hit my limit. I probably would have divorced him right away, but I was focused more on maintaining my newly found sobriety and didn't need the drama of a divorce to distract me.

The same group of trans friends was supposed to get together, but at the last minute, everyone but E and I canceled. So the two of us went out to dinner. Turns out our friends had conspired to put the two of us together. Sneaky bastards!

One thing led to another and by April, we were dating, then living together in June. I decided it was time to get divorced. R and I had been separated for some time, had no children in common, so the divorce would be cut and dried. He opted to hire an attorney. I didn't need one. The date for the court hearing was set for late August.

We Fought the Law and We Won

Meanwhile, E had scheduled a date for her gender surgery in early September of that year. We joked about the possibility of getting married since as far as the state was concerned, she was still male, even though she lived full-time as a woman and had since before we met.

My wife on our trip to Mt. Rainier

So in early August, E and I went to the court clerk in Phoenix to try our luck at applying for a marriage license.

When we told the woman behind the counter what we wanted, we were immediately rebuffed. "Two people of the same sex can't get married," she said.

We explained our situation, providing copies of E's birth certificate assigning her as male. The woman looked at it, then said, "You'll have to talk to my supervisor."

We waited an hour for the supervisor to get back from lunch. We provided our documentation, including E's birth certificate, legal name change, etc., never mentioning that I was transgender as well. As far as the State of Arizona knew, I was female and always had been. I had had my birth certificate changed shortly after my surgery.

Finally, the supervisor agreed and took us into a room to do the paperwork. We filled out the forms and then she typed them up.

"Please review this to make sure it's accurate," she said.

We looked at them. They were not accurate. They had E's old name, what we in the trans community call a deadname.

"Excuse me," said E. "That's not my legal name. I changed it per this court order." She again showed the supervisor the court-issued name change decree.

"We can't put two women's names on a marriage certificate," insisted the supervisor.

But my E, she's brilliant. She replied, "If my name were Farkle, could we get married or not? Show me the list of names that can and can't get married."

The supervisor thought about that for a moment and then conceded. "Okay, fine."

Ten minutes later, she brought us the corrected typed form and we all signed it.

Cutting Things A Little Too Close

We scheduled our wedding for the weekend before E's surgery was to take place in Bangkok. It also happened to be five days after the court date for my and R's divorce. We knew it was cutting it close, but weren't worried.

My beautiful wife on our 15th anniversary

On the morning of our divorce hearing. I showed up. R showed up. The judge was there calling cases. But when our case was called, R's lawyer hadn't shown up with the paperwork.

I was freaking out and was pissed. There was no reason to have gotten a lawyer involved in the first place, but R being the control freak he was had insisted since I was trans. And now his lawyer was MIA.

If he didn't show up, R and I couldn't get divorced that day, which meant E and I couldn't get married the following Saturday.

The judge agreed to continue calling cases. Shortly before he reached the end of his docket, R's lawyer showed up. He had forgotten about the case and had been spending the morning with his kid. Asshole!

Happily Ever After

Fortunately, all's well that ends well. R and I were pronounced divorced. Five days later, E and I got legally married, then traveled to Thailand where she got her surgery. And we've been a happily married same-sex couple for 21 years.

After more than two decades, we are still like two lovesick teenagers. To this day, every time I look at her, my pulse races. Happy biochemicals flood my brain. I am so crazy about this woman. And she is crazy about me.

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Dharma Kelleher writes gritty crime fiction with a feminist kick series and is one of the only openly transgender voices in the genre. 

She is the author of the Jinx Ballou bounty hunter series and the Shea Stevens outlaw biker series. You can learn more about Dharma and her work at https://dharmakelleher.com.

Writing While Trans, Part 3: We Deserve to Be Heroes

Here is the evolution of trans representation in crime fiction created by cisgender people:

STEP ONE: Trans people? Do they really exist? Nah!

STEP TWO: Trans hookers, always good for a laugh (not) or awkward moment.

STEP THREE: Dead trans hookers. Oh how tragic. And still a little awkward. Oh well.

Beau Bridges as a trans cop on The Closer

STEP FOUR: Trans cop or lawyer reunites with former colleagues for awkward laughs. Usually played on TV by cis men with embarrassing dialogue and stumbling around on heels. Lots of misgendering and use of transphobic slurs.

STEP FIVE: Dead trans person, but not a hooker. Look how woke we are! Still lots of misgendering and focus on body parts.

STEP SIX: Wait, is there a step six yet?

And that's in the television arena. I can count on one hand (with fingers left over) the number of times I've read a trans character in a crime novel written by a cisgender person in any of the above scenarios.

There is an assumption that because I'm transgender, I write transgender fiction. That my stories are written for trans people. Nope. Traditional publishers tried to stick me in that box and I walked away and started Dark Pariah Press instead.

I don't write coming out stories or transition stories or trans romance or trans erotica. I write gritty crime fiction, but from a trans point of view. Because we deserve to be represented as more than the tired tropes of sex workers and murder victims. We deserve to be heroes.

We deserve to be represented as people with agency, people with dignity, people who fight back against injustice. We deserve to be the lead detectives in police procedurals. The private eyes solving the crimes. And in the case of my Jinx Ballou series, the badass bounty hunters.

June 2019 marks the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, when queer people of all stripes (including trans women) fought back against years of police brutality. And while we have made some progress, so much has been pushed back since Trump took office.

I can't stop the horrific actions that Trump and his vile supporters are doing to actively and viciously make life even harder for queer people. Stripping away what few rights and protections we briefly enjoyed.

But I will continue to write exciting, balls-to-the-wall, hard-to-put-down thrillers from a transgender point of view. I write them not just for trans people, but for all fans of gritty crime fiction, to give them a glimpse of the realities faced by my community.

And I'm not alone in my quest for trans representation in crime fiction. I highly recommend Renee James's Bobbi Logan series (starting with Transition to Murder) and Jennifer Finney Boylan's recently released Long Black Veil.

And as proof that cisgender people can write fabulous trans protagonists, I also recommend Laurie Rockenbeck's Bound to Die.

So after all that, here is Step Six.

STEP SIX: We deserve to be heroes.

P.S. In honor of this historic LGBTQIA Pride Month, CHASER is on sale for only 99 cents until June 8. Get your copy now!

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As one of the only transgender authors in crime fiction, Dharma Kelleher brings a unique voice to the genre, specializing in gritty thrillers with a feminist kick. She rides a motorcycle, picks locks, and has a dark past she’d rather forget.

She is the author of the Jinx Ballou bounty hunter series and the Shea Stevens outlaw biker series. You can learn more about Dharma and her work at https://dharmakelleher.com.

Writing While Trans Part 2: Figuring Out My Brand

As many of you know, I am a transgender woman. But that's not all I am.

I am also a living kidney donor. I'm a wife. I'm a professional caregiver. I ride a motorcycle. I'm a desert dweller. I'm a recovering alcoholic. I'm a rape survivor. I've also been a goldsmith, a librarian assistant, and a web developer.

One of the things that drew me into writing was the fact that the vast majority of queer fiction were coming out stories, romance, and erotica. But there is so much more to life as a queer person than coming out, falling in love and having sex. Where were all the adventure stories, the sci-fi operas, the urban fantasies, and crime dramas with queer protagonists?

My first series, which was eventually picked up by Random House's digital-only imprint, Alibi, was about a lesbian outlaw biker. Think Sons of Anarchy meets The L Word. Pretty fucking awesome, right? I certainly thought so. My agent thought so.

But before Alibi said yes, publisher after publisher passed. Not because they didn't like it. The vast majority said they loved it, but didn't know how to market gritty biker crime fiction with a lesbian protagonist.

Turns out they didn't understand how to market a thriller with a lesbian protagonist unless it was a coming-out story or had a romantic subplot. God forbid anyone writes about lesbians who actually have a career and a life outside of a relationship.

When Alibi decided not to extend the series beyond the first two books, I realized I had to now start focusing on a new series. With a lot of input from my wife, I decided to write about a modern day bounty hunter who happened to be a transgender woman.

This time I didn't bother going the traditional route. I was going indie. If publishers didn't get crime fiction with a lesbian protagonist, they certainly wouldn't be interested in a thriller with a trans protagonist. Even when the story wasn't about her being transgender. The story was about her tracking down someone who jumped bail. You know, crime fiction.

Now I was faced with the question about how to market my stories. Do I disclose in the book blurb that the Jinx Ballou the badass bounty hunter is transgender? Will that potentially turn away readers who might otherwise enjoy the story and not really care if Jinx is trans? If I don't mention it and readers learn about her past during the middle of the story, will they be turned off then?

One the one hand, since Laverne Cox and Caitlyn Jenner appeared on the covers of glossy magazines, the media has finally started to treat trans people as human beings worthy of respect. There's been a sort of trans chic thing going, much like there was a lesbian chic going on in the 1990s. And I'm not ashamed to take advantage of it.

And the crime fiction community tends to be very inclusive and welcoming, anyway. When I reach out to media, such as podcasts who want to interview me, part of my pitch is that I'm one of the few (just me and Renee James, as far as I know) crime fiction authors who are trans.

At the same time, when it comes to the decision to buy, white heteronormative readers tend to stick with what they're familiar with: white, heteronormative protagonists. Not that they're overtly bigoted toward other kinds of protagonists. There is simply a subtle bias, a subconscious resistance, perhaps a fear of the unfamiliar.

Since the launch of Chaser and Extreme Prejudice, the first two books in the Jinx Ballou series, I have tried a wide range of approaches. Disclosing up front that Jinx is trans. And not disclosing she's trans, except in the book. I find the latter the more productive of the two.

I don't feel the need to disclose everything about who my character is in the Amazon book description. The book description is supposed to hook the reader into the story. And that's what I focus on. A bounty hunter who runs into trouble while pursuing a fugitive and chaos ensues.

Occasionally I will get a review or even an irate email complaining that while they loved the story, they don't care to read about queer characters. I once got a three-star review from a Trumpster who didn't appreciate the liberal agenda that crept into the book. Honestly, I was tickled the little shit gave me three stars.

Bottom line, I don't write queer fiction. The stories aren't about transitioning or falling in love with someone of the same sex. Few if any of my stories have a HEA as far as a romantic subplot is concerned.

Instead, I write crime fiction from a queer perspective. Or better yet, I write gritty crime fiction with a feminist kick. Like Sara Paretsky. Like Stieg Larsson. Like a lot of successful crime fiction authors who aren't afraid to challenge the patriarchy in fiction.

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As one of the only transgender authors in crime fiction, Dharma Kelleher brings a unique voice to the genre, specializing in gritty thrillers with a feminist kick. She rides a motorcycle, picks locks, and has a dark past she’d rather forget.

She is the author of the Jinx Ballou bounty hunter series and the Shea Stevens outlaw biker series. You can learn more about Dharma and her work at https://dharmakelleher.com.